Girls basketball: Sterling fights hard, but Galesburg rallies to win behind Kilgore’s 24 second-half points

STERLING – The Sterling Golden Warriors gave everything they had Wednesday night in their regular-season finale at Musgrove Fieldhouse.

Although they led Galesburg by one point at halftime, they couldn’t contain junior guard Kiarra Kilgore in the second half, as she scored 24 points to finish off a 57-46 win for the Silver Streaks.

A 17-point third quarter from Kilgore fueled a 23-14 Galesburg run and shifted the momentum of the game.

“My shots weren’t falling, so I knew I had to do something else,” said Kilgore, who was limited to five points in the first half. “So I just started attacking.”

[ Sterling vs. Galesburg girls basketball photo gallery ]

Kilgore started her 17-point scoring outburst with a coast-to-coast layup off her own rebound for a 24-23 lead with 6:34 to play. Just 22 seconds later, she stole an inbounds pass and hit an elbow jumper.

Olivia Turner buried a top-of-the-key 3 and Kirra Gibson made a layup 29 seconds apart for a 30-26 Sterling lead with 5:06 remaining, but Kilgore scored 10 points over the last 4:25, helping Galesburg (24-7, 10-4 WB6) to a 43-35 lead.

“In the locker room, we talked about how we had to play harder than the other team,” Kilgore said. “Sterling came out and they played really hard. They were better than us in the first half, so we definitely had to change things up if we wanted to change the game around and actually win.”

Delali Amankwa opened the fourth quarter with a deep 2 just inside the right wing, then Madison Austin and Olivia Melcher each hit two free throws 35 seconds apart to pull Sterling within 45-41 with 4:45 to play. An Alexis Edgerson left-wing 3 put Galesburg up 50-43 with less than three minutes left, then a Kathryn Rowzee putback got Sterling within 50-45, but the Silver Streaks made six free throws in the final minute to seal the win.

“We were still giving all our effort, but they came out with the same amount of effort,” Austin said about the second half. “We were just trying to stay as close as we could with them.”

The Warriors (3-26, 0-14 WB6) and Silver Streaks traded baskets to a 10-10 tie in the first quarter. After a back-and-forth second quarter, Rowzee and Melcher made back-to-back layups in the final two minutes, giving Sterling a 21-20 lead at the half.

“Our transition was working really well, and we’ve been working on holding them to no second chances, which we did pretty well,” Austin said of the first half. “And we got some good rebounds.”

“Just being at our home court and this being our last game, we really wanted to put it all out there. And I think it really took them off guard with how we came out and reacted. And we really stopped them in the first half,” Turner added. “We were just making sure that we rebounded and really worked together with the backside cutters. We held one of the girls to a couple points, and she’s the leading starter, so I feel like that really helped and frustrated their team.”

Turner led the Warriors with 12 points, two rebounds, four steals and a block. Austin chipped in 10 points and 12 rebounds, Rowzee had seven points, eight rebounds, three steals and three assists, and Melcher had six points, five rebounds and three steals. Amankwa added five points, five rebounds and two steals.

Kilgore tallied 29 points, eight rebounds, six steals and three assists, and Juniper Schwartzman totaled seven points, nine rebounds and two assists. Capre Ferguson, Edgerson and Syriah Boyd added six points apiece; Ferguson also had five rebounds, four assists, two steals and a block.